Monday, February 16, 2015

Learning More than Was Expected

In September of 2012 an English Language Teacher in Elementary School
decided to listen to her inner voice, gave up her secure teaching
job, and went to Russia to study. She writes about her experience in the
recent issue of the Korean Catholic Digest.

She is 26
years old, and because of her long held dream, and firm resolution, left teaching to return to being a student in Russia. From the first night
in Russia, one by one, her strong aspirations began to disappear. When
she saw her sleeping quarters she was transported back to the 70s, a
great shock to her.

The place was filled with dust and cobwebs, filled with a horrible stench, a common toilet without lights, a ceiling
that was leaking water, and a corridor that was filled with mold. Yuck! was the feeling that naturally followed from seeing her situation.

Her
roommate was Chinese who liked to listen to music to early in the
morning with little understanding of what common living meant.

She
began studying the Russian language, doing her home work, cooking her
meals and cleaning up afterwards, and little by little adapting to her
new environment. In reality, her biggest difficulty was
the discrimination she felt for being Asian. When she walked the streets the
children would confront her; laughing they would be abusing her
with words she couldn't understand, which made it all the worse. In the
post office she would have persons push themselves in line ahead of her,
which would fill her with pent up anger. Her personality was one that
would ordinarily give 'tic for tac' but since she didn't understand or speak Russian she was more than upset. What
wealth and honors was she going to enjoy that would deserve this kind
of treatment? She was an only daughter, and had a job that gave her
prestige in her society; never before did she experience this kind of abuse...
why did she ever come to Russia? She returned to her room and felt completely helpless, and began counting the days to return to Korea. At
that time Jesus came into her thoughts. Usually when she felt upset
she would go to church. The thoughts about Jesus suddenly coming to mind was strange. She
recalled how Jesus came to us and suffered all the
discrimination and abuse for love of us, it was the first time,
she ever thought about the virtue of humility.Up until
that time, she thought that she was a humble person, but realized
she was full of pride. She wanted others to appreciate who she was. She
was concerned on how she was coming across to others, and wasn't able to detach herself from the way others saw her. She knew that real
humility was not concerned with this. The study of the language was not
coming easy, she was struggling alone, but she came to
the realization that more then learning Russian she learned something
more important.Why did she come to Russia? More than regrets
she is now thankful for her experience; a
lesson that will remain with her for the rest of her life. She hopes she will be open to imitating Jesus more closely and following
his will.